GreenwoodAcademies Trust

Strategic Partnerships

The Trust has a range of highly successful and innovative partnerships with a number of organisations which are regarded as among the best available in the UK. These partnerships have brought exceptional and long-lasting benefits to hundreds of pupils and accompanying staff members.

Our major partnerships include:

Allison Consultancy

We work with this consultancy to keep all academies on the East Coast up to date with the latest information around the Sports Premium Funding and how to use it effectively. The consultants also help academies develop a consistent approach to developing PE and sport and provide bespoke training to help academies meet Ofsted’s expectations.

We are also adopting the Move Off and Think approach to delivering PE which aims to maximise the amount of time children are active during a lesson.

Bourne Leisure

We have developed a strong partnership with Butlins in Skegness to identify and develop Gifted and Talented pupils at the Skegness Academy. A programme has been developed which provides pupils with new learning opportunities to stretch their knowledge, gain new experiences and develop new skills.

Experian

We have run partnership programmes with Experian in the past for the Head Boy / Head Girl and their deputies at the Nottingham Academy and the Nottingham Girls’ Academy. We are now working with them to develop an ambitious 10-year ‘Leadership Academy’ programme at the Nottingham Academy that will include benefits for all through Human Utopia and other generic initiatives as well as providing a range of high-end interventions including the Outward Bound Trust's ‘Skills for Life’ training, university sponsorship / intern opportunities at Experian and an overseas expedition with World Challenge or similar.

Outward Bound Trust (OBT)

We have an excellent partnership with the OBT and they have provided invaluable support and leverage that has allowed us to develop three-way ‘mentoring’ programmes with DHL and intu Properties.

intu Properties

intu Properties run the Victoria and Broadmarsh shopping centres in Nottingham and have agreed for the fourth year running to sponsor 40 Year 8 students from the Nottingham Academy to take part in a five-day Adventure & Challenge (A&C) mentoring programme at the OBT Aberdovey Centre. This will be followed up later in the year with a Celebration Evening at the Victoria Centre with students, intu mentors, teachers and parents all taking part.

DHL

We run a number of very successful business partnerships with DHL including the flagship programme ‘Look into Logistics’ at the Weston Favell Academy. This three-year scheme is aimed at developing apprentices for the future. Thirty-six Year 10 pupils are enrolled onto this innovative and heavily over-subscribed project each year and they attend a five-day ‘apprentice style’ OBT course in Aberdovey. Later elements of the programme for Year 11 and Year 12 students include visits to DHL sites, work experience, mentoring support and an interview for an apprenticeship. We also run a joint DHL mentoring programme for seven of our secondary academies each November.

Ikano Bank

Over the past three years, we have been working closely with the Business in the Community team in Nottingham who have made it possible for us to develop an excellent partnership between the Nottingham Academy and Ikano Bank. ‘Cheese Matters’ is a financial management programme that was a collaborative effort between the Nottingham Academy, Ikano, Capital One and Eversheds. The programme won the 2013 Business in the Community Award for ‘Local Impact and Working in Partnership’. It has now been rolled out across Nottingham and has been completed by thousands of pupils from schools and academies across the City.

The latest programme is ‘Ikano Discovery Day’, where pupils get the chance to work with Ikano co-workers for work experience with a twist!

Browne Jacobson

Our legal advisers run a ‘MoreLaw’ mentoring programme for the Nottingham Academy, the Nottingham Girls’ Academy and the Weston Favell Academy ‘A-level’ Law students. Up to 12 students from each academy are selected each year. They receive a great insight into the legal system and are able to see civil hearings and disputes, develop their debating and legal skills and also visit the local criminal courts. The scheme concludes with a work experience placement at the firm and a fully-funded visit to the Royal Courts of Justice and Inns of Court in London. Browne Jacobson, have also recently launched an apprenticeship scheme for aspiring lawyers with six places on offer each year in Nottingham

Capital One

Our working relationship with Capital One has developed over the past three years with 60 Year 10 pupils per year from the Nottingham Academy attending a business visit and taking part in a mock interview day. Clicksilver is a mentoring programme designed to increase social mobility by closing the digital divide. Young people are trained to be mentors to older students giving our pupils valuable volunteering experience. As a result of our close links with Capital One, the Nottingham Academy was the first secondary school to deliver the programme and to date 50 students from years 10 to 13 have participated.

More recently we are piloting an initiative called Business in Classrooms where teachers attend an externship at a local business and act as ambassadors when back in school, promoting a 'careers of the future' brief to tutors and Year 8 pupils to launch a research project. Other opportunities include Confidence Building sessions for 12 Year 10 pupils and support delivering coding classes for our primary cohorts in Nottingham

E.ON

Over the past 12 months we have been working closely with E.ON on two excellent careers resources. Careers Lab sessions supported by E.ON volunteers have been delivered to our current Year 8 and 9 cohorts at the Nottingham Academy, giving pupils the opportunity to engage with E.ON employees and start to consider various careers at an early age.

Youth Pathways is a pre-apprenticeship programme designed to give young people who are considering undertaking an apprenticeship in customer service or engineering a hands on experience of the world of work. To date, 12 Year 10 pupils have completed the two-day programme, with plans for another cohort of 12 Year 11 pupils to complete the continually improving course this summer term.

Val Sabin Publications and Training

We have developed an excellent relationship with Val Sabin Val Sabin, one of the leading Physical Education practitioners in the Country. As well as offering discounted rates on her PE resources, publications and teaching manuals, Val has delivered a number of training sessions for academies within the Trust. Val is also the guest of honour at the annual Primary Athletics Championships which involves over 500 Year 5 and 6 pupils from 17 primary academies taking part in a primary indoor athletics competition at Braunstone Leisure Centre every June.

Youth Sport Trust

We have an excellent relationship with the Youth Sport Trust (YST) and presented at their national conference in 2015. All academies have full membership which demonstrates to Ofsted that they are committed to PE. In addition, all secondary academies have been involved in the My Personal Best programme which is funded by the Department for Education and delivered through the Youth Sport Trust.

The benefit of this partnership is that it provides academies with regular updates regarding the national landscape of PE as well as superb discounts on equipment, athlete mentors, resources and conferences.